Verse 599

Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration and English translation by Ganganath Jha:

भाक्तं तदभिधानं चेद्वचोभेदः प्रसज्यते ।
नच बुद्धेर्विभेदोऽस्ति गौणमुख्यतयेष्टयोः ॥ ५९९ ॥

bhāktaṃ tadabhidhānaṃ cedvacobhedaḥ prasajyate |
naca buddhervibhedo'sti gauṇamukhyatayeṣṭayoḥ || 599 ||

If the name be said to be figurative (indirect), then there should be difference in number. there is also no difference in the cognition, which is admitted by both (though directly and indirectly).—(599)

 

Kamalaśīla’s commentary (tattvasaṃgrahapañjikā):

The following might be urged—“The said criticism cannot apply to us either, because (according to us) the application of the name ‘Cloth’ to its component yarns is only indirect, figurative, based upon their being its cause; so that the use of terms like ‘all’ would be all right”.

The answer to this is provided in the following—[see verse 599 above]

If it is as you say, then there should be ‘difference in number’; i.e. in all cases, the Plural number should be used—‘all Cloths are coloured’; you do not consider it right to use the Singular number in regard to things that are many.

It might be argued that—“when the term ‘Cloth’ is used in regard to the component yarns, it is in accordance with the number of the composite object, which term ‘Cloth’ therefore does not abandon the gender and number of what is denoted by it”.

But this also cannot be right; this is what is shown in the second line—‘There is also no difference, etc. etc.’; if the applying of the name ‘Cloth’ is figurative (indirect), then the distinction between the cognition of what is direct and what is indirect would be only a halting one; because as a matter of fact, there is no difference.. For instance, when the expression is used as ‘all of the cloth is coloured’, the idea that it produces is not that ‘what is coloured is not the Cloth, but the yarns that are its constituent cause

The particle ‘ca’ in the Text implies, the following argument:—You do not admit that the Cloth, being only one, is denoted by the term ‘all’; how then can the term ‘all’, without the term ‘Cloth’, be applied to the components, on the basis of the Number of the Cloth?

Or, the second line may be explained as follows:—The ‘bheda’, diversity, of the Cognition, is not present in what are regarded as ‘direct’ and ‘indirect’; i.e. different colours are not found in the yams and the Cloth, in the way in which they are found among Colour, Taste, and other things; and when the forms of the two are not found to be different, they cannot be regarded as direct and indirect.—(599)

The following Text introduces the answer given by Śaṅkarasvāmin:—[see verse 600 below]